Day 1 - Meet and Greet
Yesterday Ellie and I didn't really do much. When I arrived, Andrea brought me out to her paddock, which she shares with two three year olds and an older yearling. The capture process didn't seem too overly complicated; she was able to walk right up to Ellie and halter her (with the aid of a bucket of grain, some of which she dumped in a feed bin in order to distract the younger beasts). I watched patiently as she brought her into the barn, tacked her without trouble, and brought her to the ring. The mare seemed a little unsure of me, but that's to be expected, I'm a complete stranger in a world of people that haven't paid her much attention.
The lunging was the most interesting part for me. Andrea put her in side reins, which were attached low by her elbows, though fairly loosely, so there was only the slightest pressure on the bit. When asked to move out on the line Elysian immediately jumped away, breaking into a brisk trot with snorts of alarm. Andrea in NO WAY is at all confrontational with this mare. In fact, quite the opposite is true. She talks to her, croons to her, and in general is very kind and gentle with her. I don't want anyone getting the idea that she is the way she is because of Andrea. Ellie was mostly wild until about six months ago remember, she is unused to human contact, and is completely new to most of the things we ask horses to do. That being said, let's move on.
Andrea did not lunge Ellie long, perhaps five minutes, trotting in both directions. Elysian continued to snort, but she did stretch down, accepting the bit while trotting in both directions. Andrea brought her back to the barn, untacked her, and hosed her lightly to demonstrate to me that Ellie was ok with this. Beyond that, I stood around grooming her for a little over an hour, chatting with Andrea, one of her boarders (who owns the yearling Ellie lives with, whom Andrea bred), and a young lady who came to ride, both of whose names I'm embarrassed to say have slipped my mind. I can remember horses I rode when I was six, I can't remember the name of a woman I met yesterday... My memory confuses even me on the best of days.
Ellie was tolerant of my touch while grooming, even relaxeing after awhile, cocking her hind leg and sighing (not sure if this was in contentment or resignation, but she did it). She allowed me to brush her down, rub my hands all over her, brush out her tail (oh her poor tail... I'll get to that later), as well as her mane. Andrea let me know that she's never pulled her mane, only cut it, so I tentatively pulled a few of the longer strands here and there, which didn't seem to bother her, so there's hope for that. Perhaps once we get a bit farther along in the Trust department we'll try that one. She needs to get used to me standing up over her first. Andrea had also told me that she also did not particularly care for having her legs touched or her feet picked up, and gave her a little bit of cocktail any time the farrier came. Right, something else to work on. I ran my hands up and down each leg, picking it up for a few moments, and praised her like she'd just won the Olympics when she allowed me to. Once she was mostly dry I brought her back out to her paddock and turned her loose with the other monkeys, where she promptly rolled in the biggest pile of dirt she could find... Typical.
Day 2 - Learning New Things
Today I arrived while Andrea was out getting grain, so I showed myself out to her paddock. I had brought with me a large bag of baby carrots, so I hoped (key word here) that I would be able to catch her as easily as Andrea had the day before. Ha ha, silly me, what was I thinking? My first mistake was letting the monkeys know I had food. Ellie is gthe lowest rung on the totem in her little herd, so when the food came out she got pushed to the back... Great. That wasn't exactly the end goal I was hoping to achieve The yearling, Niko, is by far the leader and the boss (even though he's the smallest of the four) and was the biggest of the mooches. Any time I would get close to Ellie he would herd her off in an attempt to get all the food to himself, aaaand... it worked.
See that grey butt in the back? Yeah... that's Ellie.
Thankfully, after an hour of walking around the paddock after her, Ellie finally let me catch her long enough to slip the halter over her head and get her over to the gate. This... is where the mooch once again gets himself in the way. Niko decided he wanted more of my food, and cut in between Ellie and I (underneath her lead rope), causing her to spin and bolt, ripping the lead rope out of my hands. Lovely. Now I have nothing to catch her with, and she's running around dangling her lead rope... wonderful.
About five minutes later Andrea came out to the paddock, she had obviously returned sometime while I was being mauled by babies, and she brought grain. Oh that magical grain. She had Ellie caught and out of the paddock within minutes
Note to self: tomorrow bring grain.
Today I noticed, while walking after her for an hour, that even when alone Elysian didn't particularly care to be caught. After eight years of doing nothing but living in a paddock and eating, I probably wouldn't want to be caught either, especially since she only gets caught to go to work. Again, logical, right? I'm very much hoping that this will not be the case tomorrow if I bring grain with me, but only time will tell.
I didn't want to do too much with Ellie today, being as she still does not know me and definitely does not trust me. After watching her go around on the lunge line yesterday, I had gotten the idea that maybe a lesson in basics would not be a bad place to start. I gave her a light brush down, clipped a lunge line to her halter, and headed out to the round pen.
All I wanted her to do today was walk calmly and quietly on the lunge line. The goal was to get her to just walk. Horses are herd animals, the fight or flight response being first and foremost in their mind when confronted with a problem. Needles to say Ellie has the flight response down pat. It doesn't seem that she was ever abused, but she's definitely none too trusting of humans. Asking her to walk around me is asking her to trust that I am not going to hurt (i.e. eat) her.
We started to the right, and at first she wanted to do exactly what she had done yesterday with Andrea - jump away and break right to the trot. I kept the line fairly short, and asked her to stop, which she did, almost immediately. Ok, so she has whoa down, that won't be an issue. After a few minutes (in which I am thankful I have freakishly long arms) she got the idea and was walking around me like a champ, head down, listening to me repeat the walk command like a broken record. Perfect. I stopped her and praised her heavily.
The left seemed to be more of an issue. She again, when asked to move away, wanted to move right out into the trot, though this time she did not leap away from me like I was a rattlesnake... A small improvement, but a notable one. I brought her back down to the halt, and once again repeated the same triangle maneuver that had gotten her to walk away from me to the right. Took a little longer, but after trying to trot away two or three times, and one instance of stopping square, snorting and confused, she finally got the idea and walked calmly around me in a large circle, head down, with me crooning and repeating the walk command once again.
After switching directions a few times to make sure she had the idea, I asked her ever so gently for the trot. To my glee she trotted out quietly, no snorting, and even came down to the walk after hearing the command a few times. I switched direction, and repeated. Same result. Time to call it quits after more heavy praise.
We stood at the gate for a few minutes while I praised her, at which time I noticed she kept flinching away from the coiled lunge line. All right... let's do something about this. Ever so gently I rubbed the coil of line up and down her neck, chest, shoulder, and flank of both sides. Once she had settled into that (which took a few minutes... she didn't flee, but wasn't exactly happy about it either), I gently tapped her with the rope over her sides and back, letting her get used to the feel of that as well. We will be doing much more of this.
The mare is sharp as a tack, and I don't think her training is going to take long. The trust and relaxation I'm hoping will come once she realizes the same person is going to continue to work with her and love on her.
Only time will tell.
She certainly is a stunning girl.
No comments:
Post a Comment